MAY 18, 2016
Photo: Getty
This is really getting ugly.
Tuesday was supposed to be a regular Tuesday primary night with contests in Kentucky and Oregon. As expected, Bernie Sanders sailed to victory with a 54%-46% victory over Hillary Clinton.
In Kentucky, however, Clinton won in a nailbiter– 47%-46% over Sanders. As the votes were counted, the lead see-sawed all night — at one point, after 300,000 votes had been counted, the difference between the candidates was a mere 36 votes — but Clinton pulled it out at the end in what was considered a mild surprise and snapped Sanders’ May-long winning streak. Sanders was considered a slight favorite in Kentucky a few days before the vote, so he left to campaign in Puerto Rico and California. The Clinton faction, which had vowed to spend $0 in advertising in Kentucky, smelled an opening, so Clinton poured in ad money and campaigned hard around the state, eking out the win.
Meanwhile presumptive GOP nominee Donald Trump had an easy time in Oregon, garnering 67% of the vote, compared with 16.6% for the ghost of Ted Cruz and 16.5% for the ghost of John Kasich.
What cast a pall over the evening was footage that was released on Tuesday from last Saturday’s Democratic delegate selection convention in Nevada. After last February’s primary, the result was 20 delegates for the victorious Clinton and 15 for Sanders. But at the site, the Clinton organization had more of their delegates show up than those for the Sanders campaign, and when the time came for a voice vote, Nevada Democratic Chairman Roberta Lange ruled for the more numerous Clinton side.
The Sanders delegates, believing they had out-shouted the Clinton folks, became extremely upset and yelled at Chairman Lange, claiming that the convention was rigged. Chairs were thrown, and though some say that there was violence, the footage released on Tuesday showed that there was rough-housing at the very least. The worst moment came, however, when Sen. Barbara Boxer, one of the most progressive Democratic senators in Congress, got up to speak. She was roundly booed by part of the crowd. When Sen. Boxer announced that she was for Clinton, obscene cries of “C–t!” were directed at Boxer from a number in the crowd, according to several reporters present.
When Chairman Lange returned home, she found death threats on her voice mail at home, which she played in their entirety on cable news on Tuesday.
Clearly, vitriol like this is not indicative of 99% of Sanders’ voters, who back their candidate with a passion that is the envy of every other person running for office. But the behavior displayed in that Nevada footage was not an ideal optic for a presidential candidate on primary day.
In one larger sense, the Sanders campaign has a point when they claim that Democratic National Committee Chairman Debbie Wasserman Schultz has had her thumb on the scale for Clinton. The debate schedule that the DNC had drawn up was ridiculously limited in an apparent effort to protect Clinton. But when Sanders began to do well in debates, the DNC’s limited schedule began to hurt Clinton, so Wasserman Schultz began to add more. It all smelled to high heaven.
But there are ways to protest this unfairness without throwing chairs and hurling obscenities at a progressive senator. Sanders had a phone call with NV Sen. Harry Reid, which Reid said was productive, but when Sanders put out his own statement, he made a general comment about decrying violence and harassment then immediately pivoted to blame the whole incident on the Democratic establishment. He said nothing to condemn the death threats.
Less than two months ago, Sanders decried the violence that took place at a Donald Trump rally, strongly asserting that “Mr. Trump should take responsibility for addressing his supporters’ violent actions.” I wonder where that Bernie Sanders has gone.
Democrats, who have been chortling over the potential of a disastrous GOP Convention in Cleveland this July, should be taking a very sober look at what happened at their party’s Nevada convention this weekend and worry about what will happen in Philadelphia.
Now to the delegate numbers:
THE DELEGATE COUNT
DEMOCRATS (2,383 needed to win)
Hillary Clinton 2,244 (plus 49 delegates won last night) = 2,293
Bernie Sanders 1,474 (plus 56 delegates won last night) = 1,530
REPUBLICANS (1,237 needed to win)
Donald Trump 1,144 (plus 16 delegates won last night) = 1,160
The Ghost of Ted Cruz 562 (plus 4 delegates won last night) = 566
The Ghost of Marco Rubio 167 (plus zero delegates won last night) = 167
The Ghost of John Kasich 154 (plus 5 delegates won last night) = 159
